The eponymous Tommyknockers from the ABC miniseries. Hopefully they look more intimidating in the film. Image: ABC

The Tommyknockers will soon be joining movies like It in the realm of modern Stephen King remakes thanks to James Wan, who’s attached to produced, and Universal Pictures, which just won the rights for the project.

As reported by Deadline, Universal beat out Netflix and Sony to acquire the rights to a package including the book Tommyknockers and a specific film project helmed by James Wan, who is currently attached as producer through his production company Atomic Monster. Wan is presently directing the Aquaman movie, and is responsible for the Saw franchise.

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While plans for the project were announced last month, the securing of the rights cements that this film will likely be part of the wave of King adaptations sparked by the runaway success of last year’s It reboot.

Tommyknockers, which was previously adapted as a miniseries by ABC in 1993, is one of King’s few scifi stories, about a crashed alien spacecraft that exerts a dark influence on (naturally) a small New England town. The story, which was influenced by Lovecraft, also bears a strong mark of King’s cocaine addiction, with the malignant power of the spacecraft standing in as a metaphor for King’s own struggles. The author himself later calledThe Tommyknockers “an awful book.”

No word on when the film will enter production, but between this, It: Chapter Two, The Talisman, The Bone Church and the upcoming remake of Pet Semetary, we’re going to be drowning in Kingian horror for a while yet.